Skyrim - Perfect World and Big Enough

September 1st, 2011, 08:42

Here's a pair of Skyrim articles.
IGN has a piece titled Skyrim's Perfect World and discussing "how crafting, alchemy and well-constructed mythology could make Skyrim one of the most impressively cohesive worlds in gaming":

It's an incredibly enticing prospect for the natural gaming hunter-gatherer when every collectible thing has its uses. You can even swim in Skyrim's rivers, plucking fish out of the water and roasting them on a campfire spit later. A familiar alchemy lab, meanwhile, lets you magic things like bonemeal and plants into potions to help you or hurt your enemies, experimenting with different combinations of ingredients to negate or catalyse their negative effects.

Smithing is rather more complicated. You can mine ore from deposits all over the place – from the tops of mountains to underground caves – which then has to be turned into ingots before you can use it for a helmet or a sword or a breastplate at a forge using hammer and bellows. There are grindstones for improving blades as you develop your skills. Meanwhile, all those wolf pelts that you inevitably accumulate on your adventures can be cured and made into useful, wearable, smithable leather for use at a workbench. As well as treasure and secret nuggets of Elder Scrolls mythology, you'll now be searching for rare ores and ingredients in Skyrim's hidden places. It's yet another reason to explore, and another natural way of immersing you in the game's fiction.

Though the theme of Skyrim is obviously "bigger and more," some aspects of Oblivion have had to be scaled back in the sequel. But Howard said that those decisions were motivated less by time and budget and more by a desire to present the richest overall experience.

"In Oblivion, we did … maybe nine big cities? And here, we decided 'let's do five, and make them more unique.' There are fewer of the really large cities, but the ones we have here … there's more to them," he said.

I'm inclined to believe the hype Bethesda and previewers are building here. I'm sure there will be some glitches, bugs and possible performance issues but it may just turn out to be one of the best open-world RPG's ever done. Add to that the modding, promised higher quality DLC's and I'm genuinely excited for this game. Of course, it will be Fallout 3 with no guns….

Originally Posted by Daroou
I'm inclined to believe the hype Bethesda and previewers are building here. I'm sure there will be some glitches, bugs and possible performance issues but it may just turn out to be one of the best open-world RPG's ever done. Add to that the modding, promised higher quality DLC's and I'm genuinely excited for this game. Of course, it will be Fallout 3 with no guns….

…which is not a bad thing. I just recently played a bit of FO3 again, and was struck by how much I like exploration in that game.

"In Oblivion, we did … maybe nine big cities? And here, we decided 'let's do five, and make them more unique.' There are fewer of the really large cities, but the ones we have here … there's more to them,"

Originally Posted by GhanBuriGhan
…which is not a bad thing. I just recently played a bit of FO3 again, and was struck by how much I like exploration in that game.

Funny. I've been trying for a few weeks now to be hooked on FO3, but every time I start the game I end up sitting staring at the screen wondering what I'm supposed to be doing other than constantly breaking future quests or just getting my rear end handed to me over and over again because I was clearly not supposed to enter that particular location yet even though it is right in the path of my current quest.

I'll go just about anywhere for a reason (which I did in Oblivion) but in FO3 I'm tempted to go online to find a map showing how to navigate the wasteland without screwing my game up because the game doesn't do it … which is a shame. Oh well, you can't win 'em all

— "Chess in particular had always annoyed him. It was the dumb way the pawns went off and slaughtered their fellow pawns while the kings lounged about doing nothing that always got to him; if only the pawns united, maybe talked the rooks around, the whole board could've been a republic in a dozen moves."- Commander Vimes in Thud! by Terry Pratchett

I had some problems with FO3 where I constantly did not have enough ammo to survive. Maybe that's part of the experience, but I read from others that ammo was never a problem for them. Maybe I should start looting closets and drawers more, or something. Anyway, I abandoned that game, and New Vegas as well.

[…]some aspects of Oblivion have had to be scaled back in the sequel. But Howard said that those decisions were motivated less by time and budget and more by a desire to present the richest overall experience.

"In Oblivion, we did … maybe nine big cities? And here, we decided 'let's do five, and make them more unique.' There are fewer of the really large cities, but the ones we have here … there's more to them," he said.

How is having to choose between quantity or quality not motivated by time and budget? It's a sequel on the same tech they've been using for over 5 years, they should be able to either increase the scale or keep the same scale while increasing the depth.

Its strange to hear people complain about dying when Bethesda reduces the scaling when normally they are complaining about the scaling. For ammo, hunt bandits. The school is a perfect spot. And don't waste ammo.

Originally Posted by KapitanUnterhosen
It's a sequel on the same tech they've been using for over 5 years, they should be able to either increase the scale or keep the same scale while increasing the depth.

It's a new engine, and some of the old tech. There's a limit to how big and detailed they can make a game, if you've followed the game you know they now have a full team doing dungeons, not just one person, so everything will be a lot more detailed with a lot less copy/paste. I'm sure they could make it 2x as big as Oblivion, but ofcourse not with the same of amount of detail that they will have in Skyrim.. You'd see a lot of copy/paste work and probably many rooms with just a few boxes thrown in and not much else (think Bioware games..). Personally I prefer more detail.

…uhuh. So what about the Elder Scrolls MMO they're developing separately?

Only rumors that they have a team working on that, Todd isnt the only employee Bethesda has.

Originally Posted by fatBastard()
Funny. I've been trying for a few weeks now to be hooked on FO3, but every time I start the game I end up sitting staring at the screen wondering what I'm supposed to be doing other than constantly breaking future quests or just getting my rear end handed to me over and over again because I was clearly not supposed to enter that particular location yet even though it is right in the path of my current quest.

There's an 'find extra ammo in containers' perk you can get in higher levels, fyi. But it is supposed to be a wasteland so scarce ammo just makes sense. Find a mele weap and use that when you can (to save ammo). Otherwise, the repair skill is one of the most important.

Yep, use a melee weapon when you can. At the beginning, I used the baseball bat a lot, later migrating to a ripper in emergencies. Have a backup weapon (or 2 or 3) if you run out of ammo. Don't waste ammo on enemies that are tough for you early on (like Miralurks).

What ammo shortage? Kill bandits, collect weapons, unload weapons, sell weapons, buy ammo from traders, Rivet City and whats-her-name. Just ping-pong between towns when questing. I always made it a practice to stock up whenever I had any caps. It's true, at first .44 magnum and .308 ammo is hard to come by. But it does get much easier. Energy weapon ammo is easier to find. Take the right Perks and you won't have any trouble.

Personally I don't have any ammo problems. The problem is walking around a corner/building and standing face to face with several Super Mutants with miniguns or rocket launchers when all I have is a pee-shooter and a padded vault suit. Or being overrun by mutant ants I can hardly damage at all in the very first location I discover after seeing the sun for the first time.

It almost seems like Bethesda overreacted to the critique of the hand-holding in Oblivion to the point where the "red thread" is damned hard to find in FO3. I'm finding myself trying to bypass new locations because I don't want to screw myself over by triggering something I shouldn't until much later and that is no fun.

When I reach the "right" place for a quest I'm enjoying myself while it lasts but as soon as I exit the location I'm back to: "hmm, that building looks interesting. Better not go there just yet". I don't know, maybe the Gothics burned out what little interest I had in constantly reloading and replaying the same area over and over again because a certain path turned out to be a death trap for a low level character.

Then again, perhaps I'm just getting too old for sandbox games.

— "Chess in particular had always annoyed him. It was the dumb way the pawns went off and slaughtered their fellow pawns while the kings lounged about doing nothing that always got to him; if only the pawns united, maybe talked the rooks around, the whole board could've been a republic in a dozen moves."- Commander Vimes in Thud! by Terry Pratchett

fatbastard sorry I meant to reply to Thaurin about ammo. I must be tired. Sounds to me like you need a good close range weapon like the flamer or a shotgun. You can use the quest marker to guide you if you want that. Try new strategies. It's also a shooter game and using cover and taking advantage of your surroundings is un-RPG-like. Keep trying new tactics and strategies.

My problem with crafting/alchemy: the interface. I find it slightly tedious to go from plant to plant gathering stuff, and much more tedious to organize and sort through fifty ingredient types in the inventory.

Systems I've seen that I liked better: on rest, list an inventory of locally available flora,which you can add to your inventory if you like. I know some people want the horticultural experience of pruning their own flowers, that I don't mind so much.

But the part where you combine items according to recipes is really tedious. What I'd prefer is a list of all (known) recipes vs a list of currently available (by existing ingredients) recipes. Let the player experiment, but don't force him to go through his inventory and drag/drop already known recipes to make items.